No Way Home Page 7

  “That makes sense,” said Jordan.

  Wallace frowned at the sheriff’s words. Then he said in a quiet, stubborn voice, “Well, I think he did it.”

  “A lot of folks agree with you on that, Wallace,” Bomar said.

  Royce sighed. “One thing’s for sure. We better find that boy before he gets himself lynched.”

  A silence fell over them. Bomar turned to Jordan. “So, how long are you staying around with us?”

  “I’ll be here until next week,” said Jordan.

  “I heard you’re going to give a little talk over at the high school,” Bomar said.

  Jordan marveled to himself at the man’s ear for gossip. “Yes,” he said, “the music teacher cornered me after the funeral.”

  “Oh, Miss Jones,” said Bomar. “She replaced Lulene.”

  Lulene Ansley, the sheriff’s late wife, had taught English and drama at the county high when Jordan was a student there. She had been his favorite teacher, a quickwitted, worldly woman. She had been the first to tell Jordan he had talent, to encourage his ambitions. She was pregnant with Tyler the year Jordan graduated from high school. Miss Bessie had sent him the clippings when Lulene died of cancer some years back. It seemed far too late now to say to Royce how sorry he had been.

  “There was no replacing Lulene,” he said sincerely.

  Royce looked at him angrily, as if he alone knew that, and then he looked away. “I can’t stand around talking,” he said.

  “Sheriff,” said Jordan. “I just want to know if there is anything I can do to help. About Michele.”

  Royce looked at him coldly. “It’s a little late for that,” he said. “You should have thought of that years ago.”

  Bomar Flood coughed nervously and looked away. Jordan stubbornly stood his ground. He hadn’t expected to be pelted with rose petals. “That’s as may be,” he said calmly. “But right now I am angry and I want to know if there’s anything I can do.”

  “Nothing,” Royce said stiffly. “We’re doing all that can be done. Everyone in this town is angry today. Believe me, we’ll find the one.”

  Chapter 6

  “LILLIE, NO,” SAID BRENDA, physically forcing her friend down into a chair. “It’s too soon to start working. Loretta and I just stopped by to see how you were doing. It’s only been two days since the funeral, for God’s sakes.”

  Lillie rubbed her forehead wearily. “Brenda, I thought you would understand. I can’t just sit here.”

  “I do understand,” Brenda said seriously. “It’s just like the goddamn curtains. You’re trying to keep busy, I know, but you’re exhausting yourself in the process. You need to rest.”

  “I can’t rest,” Lillie cried. “When I try to rest I keep seeing her, lying there, on that riverbank…”

  “Honey, you got to rest,” said Loretta Johnson, the black woman Brenda and Lillie employed part-time. “It’s too hard on you.”

  “Pink is working. Grayson went back to school,” Lillie protested.

  “Well, it’s a different thing,” Loretta said mildly. “You the mother.”

  The three women were silent for a moment. Brenda’s eyes filled up with tears. Lillie gripped her old friend’s hand.

  “I’m trying to think of what’s best for you, honey,” said Brenda.

  Lillie looked away from Brenda, out the window, past the Home Cookin’ van, at the gloomy gray sky. The dampness outside seemed to be seeping through the walls of the house. “I know you are,” she said. “But you can’t know how lonely it is here.”

  “I’ll come by and see you after we’re done this afternoon,” Brenda said.

  “Thanks.”

  “Are you going to be okay?” Brenda asked.

  “I’ll be okay.”

  Loretta put on her nubby green coat and buttoned it up. “I swear the weather turned just after Founders Day,” she said. “My bursitis is hurting me already.”

  “That was the last nice day,” said Lillie. She held the door open for the two women and watched them depart. When the van was down the driveway and out of sight, she turned back to the house and tried to think what to do. She had cleaned all there was to clean. She went into Grayson’s room to see if any of his clothes needed sewing. She opened his closet door and looked in. New clothes she had never seen hung on hangers, the tags still on them. A tennis racket stood in the closet.

  When did he buy this stuff? she wondered. When did he take up tennis? A buttery leather overnight bag was tossed carelessly on the closet floor and shirts still in plastic stuck out of it. He and Pink must have been shopping. She knew that Pink spoiled him, and it always annoyed her. He had treated both children alike in his love and concern for them. But he did tend to buy things for Grayson on impulse. Things the boy didn’t really need. Or he’d take him on an expensive shopping spree. It was something he would never do with Michele.

  Still, looking at the new things in the closet, she wondered how she could have been so oblivious to it. Maybe between the business and Michele, she had not been paying enough attention to Grayson’s life. As if to confirm this, she noticed the pile of sewing in the corner of his closet. No wonder he had to get new clothes, she thought. Everything that he owns needs fixing. She thought guiltily of the long hours she had spent fixing the rose-colored gown so that Michele could wear it in the pageant. It had been fun to do that, mending the lace and enjoying the feeling of the masses of rustling fabric piled on her lap. She liked to picture Michele wearing the gown while she worked. It was much more enjoyable than replacing shirt buttons and darning socks. But there was no excuse for neglecting her son like that, she thought. She bent down and gathered up the pile of clothes in her arms. I’ll do better, she thought. It was just that he was so busy with his young life. He never seemed to notice whether she was taking care of him or not. Maybe that’s why Pink bought him all these new things. Because he did notice she was neglecting Grayson.

  Not anymore, she vowed. She took the sewing to the living room and sat down with it. She was finishing the last of the missing shirt buttons when the call came from the hospital. For years now Lillie had volunteered some of her time to help out at the Cress County Hospital. She felt a deep debt to the strangers in the various hospitals they had known who had spelled her in the worst times, reading to a frightened child so that Lillie could get some sleep, bringing coffee or rolls or newspapers in those long, grim days. Still, when she heard Mary Dean Hesketh, the volunteer coordinator, on the other end of the phone, Lillie felt a shock of surprise. It almost seemed like a voice from another life.

  “I know this is a terrible time for all of y’all,” Mary Dean began apologetically, “but I’ve got a gal here who needs your help, honey. She’s got a real sick baby, and she needs a little hope. And I thought of you.”

  Lillie did not comment on the irony of it. When you spent a lot of time in a hospital, you learned to be matter-of-fact about life and death. Mary Dean was right. Lillie knew what it was to need a little hope. She was the right person to provide it. She told Mary Dean that she would come, and put on her clothes and drove to the hospital. It was not until she was in the hospital corridor, walking toward the volunteer office, that she realized she had not been out among people since the funeral. She felt unnerved by the way the world was going on with its business, as if nothing had happened. She felt suddenly ill, abnormal. She checked her buttons and zippers with fumbling fingers to be sure she had remembered to fasten herself into her clothes.

  Mary Dean, a hefty woman with flawless skin, was seated behind her desk drinking a diet Sprite. Mary Dean did not seem to see anything amiss about her, Lillie noted as she sat down. She must look normal.

  “Honey, you’re an angel to come. This little gal is up in maternity and she is just scared to death.”

  “What’s wrong with the baby?” Lillie asked.

  “He’s got a little bitty hole in his heart. They’ve got him in the ICU. I think they’re going to move him to Nashville.”

  Lill
ie stared into the arrangement of plastic geraniums on Mary Dean’s desk. “It sounds familiar, all right.”

  “That’s right,” Mary Dean said firmly. “You’ve got experience, Lillie. You understand these things. Now I want you to go in there and tell her how great the surgeons are these days, and how tough these kids can be.”

  Lillie looked up at her with wide, anguished eyes. “And what if I start to cry?”

  “That’s all right,” Mary Dean said matter-of-factly. “She knows you’re a mother. She’ll figure you’re crying in sympathy. That’s why I’m sending you. Because she’s only going to listen to another mother who’s been there.”

  “And what if she asks how Michele is now?” Lillie asked evenly.

  “Well, honey, you’re going to have to pretend a little bit. You’re gonna tell her that Michele is fine. You tell her how Michele was even sicker than her own little boy, and how she survived, and got well, and turned out fine. That part is true, isn’t it?”

  Lillie felt an unexpected sense of gratitude toward Mary Dean. It felt good to hear someone say how well and strong her daughter had turned out. She realized that ever since it happened, people referred to Michele in those same hushed, pitying tones they had when she was sick. As if she were somehow tainted. A victim again.

  “Go on, now,” Mary Dean was saying. “And let me know how it went.”

  Lillie took the name and room number and rode the elevator to the maternity floor. She hesitated outside the room, afraid for a moment that she would not be able to do it. But when she walked in and saw the terrified mother’s face, she felt suddenly calm. She thought how Michele would be proud of her if she got through it without tears.

  The new mother was too distraught to notice the pallor of the comforting hand on her own. Her spirits seemed to flare as Lillie told her seriously that they would have to fight, she and her son, but that they could win. The woman pressed Lillie’s hand to her hot cheek before Lillie left the room, and thanked her sincerely.

  The visit gave Lillie a little lift. Preoccupied with her thoughts, Lillie passed through the doctors’ waiting area outside the maternity wing and pressed the button for the elevator. She thought she heard someone call her name, and she turned around to see a pregnant woman struggle up from her chair and lumber toward her.

  “Miz Burdette,” said the young woman.

  Lillie frowned. “Yes?”

  “I’ve been waiting for you. I’m here for my checkup.” She placed a protective hand on her own stomach. “I spotted you going in there and I waited. I’ve got to talk to you.” The girl saw from the puzzled look on Lillie’s face that the woman did not recognize her. “I’m Debbie Par-tin,” she said. “Dwight Partin’s wife.”

  “Oh, yes,” Lillie said in a wary voice. She had a vague recollection from Michele’s funeral of a frail, very pregnant girl in a lavender raincoat flattening herself against the church steps as Grayson and her husband nearly came to blows. Lillie pressed the elevator button again.

  “Could we talk for a minute?” Debbie asked. “Sit down somewhere out of the way? I don’t want anyone to see me talking to you, ‘cause if word got back to Dwight that I was talking to you he’d figure out why and he’d kill me.”

  “Look,” said Lillie, “there’s nothing for us to say.” She could feel herself beginning to tremble, like someone who has gotten up from a sickbed too soon. She checked the floor light on the elevator. It was sitting still in the lobby. “I have to go.”

  “It’s about Ronnie Lee,” the girl whispered. “It’s important.”

  Lillie looked up at the floor number lights, which had begun to change.

  “Over here.” Debbie pointed.

  With a sigh more of worry than exasperation, Lillie followed the young woman as she waddled toward an alcove in the waiting area where no one else was seated. She settled herself into the molded plastic seat of a chair. Lillie perched on the chair opposite her and looked longingly at the elevator doors as they opened and closed again. “What is it you want?” Lillie asked.

  “Ronnie Lee didn’t kill your little girl,” Debbie said earnestly.

  Lillie pressed the heels of her hands against the hard edges of the chair seat. “Well, I don’t know about that,” she said.

  Debbie leaned over and tugged at her sleeve like a child. “I know I’m right,” she said. “Oh, Miz Burdette, you don’t know what it’s been like for us since your daughter was killed. Everyone is treating us so bad. Nobody’ll talk to us, and kids come and throw rocks at our trailer at night, and I’m afraid Dwight is going to get fired from his job. He works down there at the discount furniture place, doing deliveries in their truck. And now they’re saying they might not need him. They say it’s slow, but really it’s not. It’s their busiest season. And we’ve got a baby almost here,” she said in a pleading voice. “Dwight needs that job.”

  Lillie could hardly believe that this girl could be complaining to her about her troubles. She felt like reaching over and shaking her and saying “Don’t you know my child is dead? How dare you complain to me?” She recalled her father saying to her once, “Everyone thinks his own troubles are the worst.” She took a deep breath and composed herself.

  “That’s a shame,” she said dully. “People shouldn’t be blaming your husband for what his brother did. But that’s human nature, I guess.” She looked at the girl’s stricken face and softened. “I guess, if you want me to call his boss at the furniture store I could do that. If that would help.”

  The girl sat up in her seat as if startled. “That’s so sweet of you. Why, thank you. Really. With all you been through.” She shook her head. “That is sweet. But no, that’s not it. You see, I reckon this is going to go on as long as people think Ronnie Lee did this.”

  “Well, it seems as if he did,” Lillie said coldly. She stood up. “If you want me to call that man at the furniture store, I will. I don’t believe you can ask any more of me than that.”

  “Dwight could prove Ronnie Lee didn’t do it, but he won’t,” the girl blurted out. “He’s protecting his hiding place.”

  Lillie stared at the girl, who began shaking her head. “He’ll kill me if he finds out I told you. He’ll loll me. But it’s not fair. I can’t stand any more of this. No one’ll even talk to me,” she wailed. She started to sniffle and pulled a tissue out of the fringed cotton bag she was carrying.

  Lillie sat back down in the chair and continued to stare without speaking.

  “Dwight’s a good person, really. He’s kind and nice. Not one bit like that shiftless brother of his. But he has this notion that he’s always got to protect him. And Ronnie Lee doesn’t deserve it. He’s always been bad and now he’s ruining everything for us and Dwight won’t say boo. But I have to think of the baby,” she said earnestly, looking at Lillie with imploring eyes. “That’s why I’m telling this to you. You’re a woman. You can understand. I don’t want people calling my baby names. Making a poor baby suffer when all the time Dwight knows where Ronnie Lee is and knows everything that happened.”

  “What do you know about my daughter’s murder?” Lillie asked in a low, icy voice.

  Debbie took a deep breath. “All right. Just please promise me you won’t tell anyone where you heard it.”

  “I’ll try not to let anyone know,” said Lillie.

  “Because if Dwight found out—”

  “Please,” Lillie said through gritted teeth.

  Debbie hiccuped and was silent for a moment. Lillie watched her solemn, childlike face as she waited, fearfully, for the girl’s information. Debbie looked up at her with round, determined eyes. “Okay,” she said. “The day your daughter…the day of the picnic, we were home ‘cause I didn’t feel good. The first we heard of the jail-break was when Ronnie Lee called Dwight. He was hiding out over at Caitlin’s Crossing and he wanted Dwight to come get him. Dwight tried to tell him to go back but Ronnie Lee was cursing him and arguing with him. I begged Dwight just to leave him there, but Dwight said he ha
d to go get him. I threatened to call the sheriff so he made me come with him. We drove over to the crossing and picked him up.”

  “When was that?” asked Lillie, feeling a tightness in her chest.

  “About four o’clock,” Debbie said. “He knew this woman in Kentucky who he met one time when he was out of jail. He called her up and she came to meet us, about three hours from here. He was drinking the whole way, singing these stupid songs.” Debbie shuddered with remembered disgust. “He was so drunk by the time we got there we had to roll him into the backseat of her car. She was so happy to see him. I thought, good riddance, you’re welcome to him. He even threw up in the back of her car but she was happy as a snake in a swamp. He’s still there with her, although they’re fighting like cats and dogs. He called us twice from there. I think he’s getting ready to take off though. Probably find some other girl to sponge off of.”

  Lillie’s mind was working furiously as the girl spoke. The girl was telling the truth. She was sure of that. But it forced her to think about something she had not wanted to think about. She had numbly accepted the idea of Ronnie Lee as the killer, and it made it seem like Michele’s death had been almost accidental, as if she had been hit by a car. She had fallen into the path of an oncoming criminal, who was out to kill a girl. Any girl.

  Now everything was different. If it wasn’t Ronnie Lee, then maybe it wasn’t accidental. Maybe it was deliberate. Maybe someone had killed Michele, her Michele, on purpose. She felt all her psychic wounds start to bleed again, all at once. Suddenly she remembered different things the sheriff had said. Different things she had heard. All along Royce had been saying that he didn’t think it was Ronnie Lee. That he had no motive. That he wouldn’t risk such a crime, that he just wanted to get away. But who, then? Why? She shook her head. Then she looked up at Debbie. “So, it couldn’t have been him,” she said.

  Debbie shrugged. “It wasn’t. We were with him.”

  “But why are you telling me? Why not tell the sheriff?”

  “I told you,” Debbie explained patiently. “Dwight would kill me. But you can tell the sheriff. You can give him the address where Ronnie Lee is, and they can get him and say they just tracked him down. Then the whole thing will come out and people will know it wasn’t Ronnie Lee.”